Could the society of post-Edwardian England have been so lacking in libido? Among the upper class anyway, sex was something that had to be imported from exotic foreign lands in the person of the Turkish visitor Mr. K. Pamuk.
The women always are shown buttoned to the neck, even in bed, the men so reserved, so indifferent to the allure of the opposite sex one wonders how anyone got born at all. Indeed, the only physical affection, almost, that is shown at Downton Abbey is between two men! Is author Julian Fellowes **that** ignorant of the Way of a Man with a Maid?
This is of course a character-driven series. The story is pure soap, with absurd plot contrivances one after another. Some of the titled aristocrats behave most ignobly. One or two of the servants show noble, if not saintly qualities. One jarring note is Elizabeth Montgomery. Her portrayal of the American-born Lady of the Manor is decidedly middle class, more June Cleaver (from the fifties sitcom "Leave it to Beaver") than Jenny Jerome.
Many reviewers have raved about Maggie Smith's performance but I found her one-note portrayal of the Dowager Duchess, living firmly in the past and speaking like a character out of Thackeray, caricaturish and tedious.
The women always are shown buttoned to the neck, even in bed, the men so reserved, so indifferent to the allure of the opposite sex one wonders how anyone got born at all. Indeed, the only physical affection, almost, that is shown at Downton Abbey is between two men! Is author Julian Fellowes **that** ignorant of the Way of a Man with a Maid?
This is of course a character-driven series. The story is pure soap, with absurd plot contrivances one after another. Some of the titled aristocrats behave most ignobly. One or two of the servants show noble, if not saintly qualities. One jarring note is Elizabeth Montgomery. Her portrayal of the American-born Lady of the Manor is decidedly middle class, more June Cleaver (from the fifties sitcom "Leave it to Beaver") than Jenny Jerome.
Many reviewers have raved about Maggie Smith's performance but I found her one-note portrayal of the Dowager Duchess, living firmly in the past and speaking like a character out of Thackeray, caricaturish and tedious.